frEEks, gEEks, and wEEds

Lately I have been kind of consumed with two television fascinations which are old to some, but brand spanking new to me.  They are totally unrelated to each other, and have nothing in common, and were produced years apart from each other.  Yet I have kind of fallen in love with both of them in different, yet equally huge ways.

These shows are Weeds, and Freaks and Geeks.  For those unfamiliar, a brief summary of each:

Weeds stars the BEAUTIFUL Mary Louise Parker as Nancy Botwin, a widow and mother of two.  Nancy's husband has died shortly before the beginning of the series, leaving her alone to raise her two kids Silas and Shane.  To make ends meet, she takes up selling marijuana to neighborhood stoners in her perfect little cookie-cutter town of Agrestic.

Freaks and Geeks takes place in the '80s and centers around several high school students.  At the forefront stand Lindsay Weir and her younger brother Sam.  Lindsay is still trying to find herself, and finds herself drawn to the "Freak" crowd, while her brother is very naturally a "Geek."

These two shows are so vastly different in every way imaginable, except for maybe the fact that they are single-camera dramedies with no laugh track.  Yet I am still inclined to write about them together, because today, whilst pondering them, all of the things I loved about each of them were coming to me and surprising me that they could be so different, yet entertain me so much.  It dawned on me that my enjoyment of these two showed proved a hypothesis I've always believed.  There are many elements to any filmed work, be it a tv show or a movie.  There is the writing.  The acting.  The editing.  The direction.  The actual story.  The cinematography.  Countless other elements.  Typically, we as viewers take the sum of all these parts and then decide if the tv show or movie we are watching is "good" or not.  All too often, if just one of these elements does not live up to our expectations, we tend to hastily write off the work as not being "good."  It's only human nature, I think.  I've tried to be more open-minded (for lack of a better term - I'm a self-proclaimed loather of the usual concept of open-mindedness) while watching anything I've never seen before, in recognizing all of the elements on their own, rather than solely on the "big picture", so I can learn to appreciate almost anything.  For example, if one decides they really hate the way the dialogue is written in a movie or tv show, and therefore decides they don't like the entire work, one might be depriving oneself of being able to appreciate a stellar acting performance by one of the performers forced to recite said bad dialogue.

Now onto our current subjects, "Weeds," and "Freaks and Geeks."  "Weeds" airs on Showtime.  Since Showtime is a cable network, the show is profanity laced and offers more than just glimpses of illegal activities (including, but not limited to, the consumption and sale of marijuana), and frequent sexual activity complete with full-frontal male and female nudity.  A lot of these activites are obviously only added to the show to gain viewers.  "Weeds" would be just as enjoyable without so much bad language and nudity.  But, being on a cable network also allows the writers more freedom to do whatever they'd like within the world they have created.  These elements give the show a gritty, harsh feel, while simultaneously maintaining a very comic, gimmicky, unrealistic atmosphere.  One thing that really stands out are a the performances of Mary-Louise Parker, who plays the main character, and Elizabeth Perkins, who plays Celia Hodes; the town snob who treats her family like crap and only cares about herself, and how she is perceived by her "friends."  Parker's and Perkins' characters are given very silly situations to react to and mediocre dialogue, yet the viewer has no choice but to fall in love with them simply because these two actresses are able to read deeper than simply what is given to them in their scripts.  They find these layers within their characters and push them out for us to see, and really connect with them.  As a young, conservative, straight-laced male, I never thought I would be able to sympathize with a middle-aged widowed mother of two teenagers, who sells marijuana.  But I find myself pulling for her.  Rooting for her to get out of whatever bit of trouble she gets herself into.  For the thirty minutes that the show sucks me in, her immorality is fully justified in my mind, and only when it's all over do I stare blankly at the closing credits and say.. "That was insane."

Back to my original point, if I let my prejudices that I hold in my mind; the ones that help me decipher what should be considered moral or immoral; deter me from watching a show that I already know will contain gratuitous sex and drugs, I would miss out on superb acting by two very under-rated actresses.

"Freaks and Geeks" is a show that originally aired in 1999.  I didn't watch tv in 1999.  I am now kicking myself for that.  It debuted when I was 17 years old and in high school, just like several of the main characters in the show.  They deal with issues that I remember dealing with myself.  The show is full of heart, wonderful stories, wonderful characters, and I can find very few faults within it.  But the thing that fascinates me the most is how fitting the title is.  The students in the high school that are focused on are all either considered "freaks" or "geeks," although this is a moniker that members of neither group would ever place on themselves, they freely refer to their opposites as such.  In the center of all of this is the character of Lindsay Weir.  Finding herself drawn to a small clique of "freaks," she has a "geek" brother who she cares about very much, and thus serves as a bridge between the two worlds.

In the episode "Kim Kelly Is My Friend," we see this clash between the two groups spelled out for us in a very obvious, yet moving way.  Kim Kelly (a "freak) invites Lindsay to her house for dinner.  Kim attempts to use Lindsay to show her parents that she can have well-adjusted friends who are good influences on her, with the hopes that she will be able to keep her car.  At Kim's house, we see instantly why she is the way that she is.  Her mother is likely a worse influence on her than her friends are, her father is absent, her step-father is illiterate and bitter, and her brother is slightly retarded from being beaten up, and just sleeps on the couch all day and night.  In this environment, things eventually go haywire, and Kim and Lindsay leave, with Kim's mom and step-father now believing that Lindsay is no better than any of Kim's other friends.  From here, Kim and Lindsay go to Lindsay's home for dinner instead.  This immediate transition of environments make it blatantly obvious how different these two worlds are, and what happens when they clash.  When some more of Kim and Lindsay's freak friends show up, more chaos ensues; but this time it's in the comfort of a nice household, and is resolved with a much happier outcome.

As mentioned above, I didn't watch tv in 1999, but this show certainly would have appealed to me, had I given it a chance.  I am still thankful to have had the opportunity to see it at this stage in my life, for it offers a certain vibe of reminiscence as I think back on my own high school days, and clashes with cliques outside of my own.  But I still have to wonder how watching this show would have affected me in 1999.  Life does indeed imitate art, in my opinion, and I'd like to think I could have learned a lot from this show.  While it's primary purpose is to entertain, it also serves as a means of enlightenment to those who find themselves relating to VERY relatable characters.

If you've made it this far, I thank you for hanging in there.  Perhaps my opinions don't mean much to you, but that's why they are called opinions.  It is my desire that if you got nothing else out of this, that you try to recognize anything positive about a particular film or show that you may not otherwise enjoy, and focus on that aspect of it.  Learn to appreciate it.  And if it has no obvious redeeming value, feel free to dislike it; but until that is evident, be fair.

Back to blogging.

I used to keep an online journal pretty regularly.  It was on Livejournal.  I got a little personal on it, and sometimes felt like I was just looking for attention and pity, so I ended up deleting it.  For some time now, I have wanted to start a blog such as this one.  One where I can write movie reviews, or talk about anything that is a current fascination of mine, be it some tv show, or even a single actor, or what's going on in the baseball world.

This is that blog.

Now the task at hand is to get used to writing in it regularly.  For you, my readers, I hope I can do that.  And I hope I can make it enjoyable for you.  I ask that you please respond to opinions I make on here.  Especially if you disagree.  Few things are as enjoyable to me as debating about what makes a good or bad movie, or themes and messages within individual movies.  My guess is I will only have a couple of followers to begin with, but I hope to eventually make this a nice place for film and pop culture discussion.  Enjoy, if I can get myself in gear to continue.....